KASTURI Vs. IYYAMPERUMAL

JUDGEMENT

(1.) Leave granted. The only question that needs to be decided in this case is whether in a suit for specific performance of contract for sale of a property instituted by a purchaser against the vendor, a stranger or a third party to the contract, claiming to have an independent title and possession over the contracted property, is entitled to be added as a party/defendant in the said suit.

(2.) Before we take up this question for decision in detail, the material facts leading to the filing of this case may be narrated at a short compass. The Appellant herein has filed the suit against the respondent Nos. 2 and 3 for specific performance of a contract entered into between the second respondent acting as a power of Attorney of the third respondent on one hand and the appellant on the other for sale of the contracted property. In this suit for specific performance of the contract for sale, the respondent Nos. 1 and 4 to 11, who were admittedly not parties to the contract and setting up a claim of independent tide and possession over the contracted property, filed an application to get themselves added in the suit as defendants. The trial court allowed the application on the ground that as the respondent Nos. 1 and 4 to 11 were claiming title and possession of the contracted property, they must be held to have a direct interest in the subject-matter of the suit, and therefore, entitled to be added as parties defendants in the suit as their presence would be necessary to decide the controversies raised in the present suit. The High Court in revision confirmed the said order and accordingly against the aforesaid order of the High Court this Special Leave Petition was filed at the instance of the appellant which on grant of special leave was taken up for hearing in presence of the parties.

(3.) In order to decide the question, as framed herein earlier, it is necessary to consider the relevant provisions of the Code of Civil Procedure (in short the CPC) under which the Court is empowered to add a party in the suit. However, our answer to the question framed, as raised by the learned counsel for the parties, is that the High Court as well as the trial court had acted illegally in the exercise of their jurisdiction in allowing the application of the respondent Nos. 1 and 4 to 11 for their addition as defendants in the suit. There are certain special statutes which clearly provide as to who are the persons to be made as parties in the proceeding / suit filed under that special statute. Let us take the example of the provisions made under the Representation of the People Act. Section 82 of the aforesaid Act clearly provides who are the persons to be made parties in Election Petitions. There are other special statutes which also postulate who can be joined as parties in the proceedings instituted under that special statute, otherwise the provisions of the CPC should be applicable. So far as addition of parties under the CPC is concerned, we find that such power of addition of parties emanates from order 1, Rule 10 of the CPC. As we are concerned in the instant case with order 1, Rule 10 of the CPC, we do not find it necessary to refer to other provisions of the CPC excepting Order 1, Rule 10 of the CPC which reads as under: rule 10 (1)